Hell Down Under: Another student attacked

NEW DELHI: Even as the Australian government set up a task force to deal with the problem of growing violence against Indians, yet another attack was reported against an Indian student in Melbourne.

According to reports from Australia, a 21-year-old Indian student, Nardeep Singh, was the victim of an attack in Melbourne. A group of five men stopped Singh, who is from Ludhiana, and demanded cigarettes and money, following which one of the attackers slashed him with a knife, said reports quoting the Australian police.

Singh is a nursing student at the Chisholm Institute in Melbourne and had arrived in Australia a month ago. This is the ninth incident against an Indian in the last month and comes a day after Indian students held a demonstration to protest the attacks.

The latest incident was reported even as the Australian government announced that a new task force headed by the national security adviser Duncan Lewis had been set up to deal with the cases of violence.

Foreign minister Stephen Smith told Australian Parliament that the government was taking all the steps to find and prosecute the attackers and that the first meeting of the task force had already taken place.

"The task force will include senior officials from the department of foreign affairs and trade, the department of education and workplace relations, the department of immigration and citizenship and the attorney-general's department," Mr Smith said according to transcripts.

"Australia takes very seriously its reputation as a safe destination for international students and on Monday, in the House, the prime minister spoke on behalf of, I think, all members and Australians in deploring and condemning the recent outrageous attacks on young Indians studying or working in Australia," he added.

So far nine incidents have taken place in a month's time. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had conveyed India's concerns to his Australian counterpart Kevin Rudd who had promised to take steps for the security of Indian students studying in Australia.